Easier to Lie
by fieldagent85
Summary: Fifteen years prior to his death, Nora catches William in a lie, leading both of them to seriously reevaluate their various relationships.


October, 1991

Pasadena, California

Nora Walker sat alone in the dark, waiting, plagued by thoughts she prayed were outrageously fictitious. Each vision was worse than the last, taunting her mercilessly as the moments passed at a speed that would have made an ailing turtle cringe. When at last he entered the house that they shared, she stood solemnly to greet him.

"Hey," he said, nervously. "You're up late."

She stood slowly and deliberately, fueling the suspense that was gradually building up inside him.

"So it would appear." Then she paused for effect. "How's Saul?"

"Oh, you know. The poor guy's a wreck. I had to stop him myself after the fifth beer and it was all I could do to keep him away from the hard stuff. He really is a sight."

Nora stared at him for a moment, drawing upon all the strength within her in order to keep from falling apart. Her cool was kept, and erect she stood. Not only that, but she managed to elicit a malicious, skeptical laugh that sent chills right up her husband's spineless back.

"It's funny." She chuckled again. "Not only do you insist upon deceiving me but you do it in the most unbelievably calculated fashion."

He laughed apprehensively, involuntarily even. "What?"

Nora smiled sweetly and shook her head. "Oh, nothing. I was just thinking that Saul didn't look at all as you've just described him when he arrived to pick up Justin a few hours ago."

That was it. The look on his face and she knew. But damned if she wasn't going to pretend she didn't.

"Nora, I…" He stuttered, very nearly dumbfounded.

She held her hands up, signaling both grand, sweeping defeat and inevitable denial. And then the tears came.

"Just…just tell me it's not what I think it is. Tell me it's some secret business venture, tell me you're planning a surprise party, tell me…tell me anything. Just don't tell me…that. Please don't tell me that."

She was pleading with him now, with him and with God. God, who had arranged and authorized their sacred union and him who had prorposed it. In one swift, blinding motion, one of them- or maybe both- was about to desecrate it. Reluctantly, she looked up into his guilt-ridden eyes and suddenly saw a man so helpless and desperate, to the point where she was almost tempted to sympathize with him. Almost.

When he didn't speak, she knew he had something to say. She knew it was just as she had imagined. Just as she had feared. And then she panicked.

"Oh, no. No, no, no, no, no. No!" She exclaimed, losing all semblance of calm. "You can't…I don't…how…"

He moved toward her. She jerked away.

"Nora, honey, listen to me…"

"Listen to you? Listen to you?! I've been listening to you for twenty-five years, what have _you_ been doing? My God, twenty-five years! Twenty-five years, happily married. At least, _I_ thought we were happy. I was happy." She shrugged. "I was happy."

"I _am_ happy!" William insisted.

"Well, sure, now that you've got your little love bunny on the side. Of course you are."

"Nora, if you would just…"

"Just what? Just let you speak? You haven't earned the right to speak, you…you…" Despite her best efforts, the tears returned and the power of her tone faltered. "You."

There was a pause. Long and agonizing, the rest of the world seemed to pause along with their own silence. She waited to wake up, but she never did. Her knees began to shake and she dared not make eye contact. She could feel his own anguish from where she stood; it made no difference. He was the cause of his own damn anguish, he had no right to cause her any in the process. She closed her eyes, refusing to vindicate him with any more of her precious, virtuous tears. After the last of the rebel tears had made their point, she began to pace back and forth. He did not move. He hadn't moved. It was too late to project an aura of steadfastness. Too late to give her a subliminal symbol of his faithfulness. It didn't exist. She wished he didn't.

When at last he dared speak again, he did it so that his meaning transcended his words. He did it so that whatever words needed to be said were said before she could scare them away.

"Her name is Holly."

Nora looked up at him suddenly, fire burning fierce in her eyes, all traces of tears evaporated.

"Oh, she has a name. She has a name. Well, whoop-dee-doo for her, but unfortunately, I don't give a shit what her name is! In fact, if you don't mind, I'm just going to call her The Whore for the duration of this conversation which, I imagine, is very rapidly coming to its all too inevitable climax!"

She lost her breath and he caught it. He sighed in frustration. Villain or not, the inability to explain yourself is a terrible, terrible thing.

"Since you don't seem to be inclined to let me explain myself, would you, at the very least, allow me three words?"

Three words. Unless he splits up the contraction in "I'm sorry," she couldn't conceive of what he could possibly have to say.

"Fine."

He took a deep breath, and she noticed the expression on his face change drastically. It was an expression she knew well. She held her breath in anticipation now that it had returned.

"I love you."

She fell silent and, for a brief moment, he thought he might have earned the right to speak. But it was simply not his day.

"Get out."

His jaw dropped, not only at the harshness of her words but at the severity of her tone. And the malice. The malice.

"Now. Get out."

"Nora, don't do this," he begged her.

Suddenly, the malevolence in her voice and the anger in her face fled, replaced by fear and devastation.

"Please, just go. Just…go until Justin comes home. I don't…I don't want him to see…this, whatever this is. I don't care when you come home, a day, a week, an hour. I don't care if you set up house with the new love of your life, just…go."

He nodded solemnly out of respect for her reasoning and headed for the door. With his hand on the knob, he turned around, his eyes falling upon her small, shaken frame.

"Nora?"

She looked up.

"_You_ are the love of my life."

Her breath caught in her throat, but she just swallowed it back down again.

"Were," she whispered, for her ears only.

But his ears had picked up the sound too.

"Are," he said, firmly. "Are."

--

Once he had gone, Nora Walker hadn't the faintest idea what to do with herself. She had never been taught the appropriate etiquette for such a delicate situation. She never thought such a lesson would be necessary. Directionless, she stared at the closed front door for several long, aching moments before moving a single part of her body. When she did, she instinctively climbed the stairs, entered the bathroom, and discarded her clothes. She turned the shower on, but stood in front of the mirror for nearly a minute before stepping into it. She wondered if the image presented to her by the mirror was what had gotten her into her present situation. Was she so undesirable?

She spent close to half an hour standing stationary underneath the shower head. She made no attempt to cleanse herself in any way, she made no effort to do anything at all. After thirty minutes, when her knees began to weaken, she slowly lowered herself down onto the floor of the bathtub and laid down on her back, unwilling to move. The pressure of the hot, steaming water began to make her numb after awhile and so she had no desire to make it stop for close to forty-five minutes. It was only when she heard the loud commotion of her eleven-year-old returning with his uncle that she even remotely considered reality and what that meant. At that moment, it meant quickly turning off the shower, throwing on a bathrobe, and descending the stairs to prove she was alive after all.

Justin squinted his eyes when she came into view, struggling to compare this image with the image he had always had of her in his mind. They certainly did not match. Saul's face immediately betrayed his confused concern. The three stood in silence for a telling moment before Justin stepped forward and hugged her, parting without a word when he subsequently ran upstairs. Then he was gone and the wronged widow was forced to face her brother. How could she tell him her husband had cheated on her? How mortifying, how degrading, how insulting. How little of her he must think. How hard for her to admit how little of her he must think.

"It's William, isn't it?"

Saul Holden thought back to his last conversation with his little sister, in which she was under the impression her husband was out with _him_ for the evening, and knew. She did not, or could not, answer him. She merely broke out into an overwhelmingly warranted fit of tears and fell into his arms.

"It's okay…it's okay…everything's gonna be okay…everything's all right…"

--

William Walker entered Mistress' house without knocking. His name was on the deed after all. He could come and go as he pleased. Mistress' feelings on the matter were obsolete. They usually were.

Mistress whose name was Holly was in the kitchen washing dishes. The baby, who was not quite a baby anymore, was asleep. She dropped a glass into the soapy water when he entered the room without warning.

"Jesus Christ, William, you scared God's own shit out of me."

Mistress had always had a way with words. William Walker did not respond. He leaned against the counter pensively. Mistress whose name was Holly cracked a pleased smile.

"I thought I'd seen the last of you this evening." She folded her arms across her chest. "What, did the Wife kick you to the curb or something?"

She was only joking. She couldn't have known. But when, once again, William Walker neglected to respond, Holly Harper knew it wasn't a joke.

"Oh my God," she whispered. "Oh my God, you're kidding me."

She could not help the slight feeling of elation that came over her. Fortunately, he did not notice.

"She caught me in a lie. She was waiting for me when I got home tonight," William Walker said flatly.

"Oh my God," was all she could say.

He sat down at the kitchen table and dropped his head in his hands. Holly Harper observed him in silence, rendered speechless when she saw him cry for the first time in the years she had known him. She sat down across from him at the table, but did not dare try to touch him.

"What did she say? Do?" Holly asked timidly.

"What do you think she did, Holly?" William questioned pointedly. "She lost it. And then I lost her."

Holly was both embarassed and frightened by the desperate tone of his voice. She hated that he loved his wife. She hated that about him.

"What happens now?"

He stood up then and began pacing around the room, distraught. She watched him in anxious anticipation.

"This has to end."

Her eyes darted up to meet his.

"What does?" She asked, more frightened than she could remember being in her life.

"This. Us. I can't do this anymore." He closed his eyes for a moment. "If she leaves me…"

"What?" Holly said, angrily. "If she leaves you, what?"

William sighed, as he always did when he hesitated to divulge the truth to one who was certain not to appreciate it.

"If she leaves me, I won't be worth it anymore. I won't be worth anything."

She pressed the palms of her hands against her tear ducts in order to discourage the tears that were more than prepared to go to battle for her.

"How do you know? How can you possibly know what you'll be like without her? You've never been without her before. Not since you've been with her anyway."

He sat down again.

"She's my whole life."

And so the tears engaged in active combat.

"And what am I? What the hell am I? Death? You were cheating on life with death. What do you need death for if you've got such a great life?"

He took a deep breath before daring to respond.

"It's not…that I don't love you."

Holly nodded, as if she had heard him say it before. She hadn't really, she had only imagined it. Worst case scenario.

"It's that you love her more," she finished for him.

He bowed his head contritely.

"Yes."

Worst case scenario.


End file.
